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Monthly Archives: July 2016

Today is my son Jonathan Robiinson’s birthday. If you know Jonathan be sure to wish him a happy birthday! Happy Birthday, Jon!

Easy Apple Bread Pudding

I have been noticing how big the apples have been getting on the trees! Everywhere I look here in Pennsylvania, I see old apple trees and it reminds me that its time to make Easy Apple Bread Pudding. Here’s a link to my recipe. http://hubpages.com/food/Apple-Bread-Puddling

Here’s a photo of some Apple Bread Pudding that I made in cupcake papers. This way we can have this delicious dessert anytime!

Easy Raspberry Chocolate Pie

Here’s another dessert that I love to make. I especially like to make it on hot days when it is too hot to cook. Check out my recipe for Easy Raspberry Chocolate Pie

Growing Summer Squash All Summer Long

Remember last week when I mentioned that summer squash becomes over abundant during the summer months? Some years, however, summer squash fizzles out after high temperatures. If this happens to you, you don’t necessarily have to call it quits with summer squash. if you have at least 50 dys until the next expected frost, you can grow another crop. Read about this in the article Growing Summer Squash all Summer Long http://hubpages.com/living/Summer-Squash-Grown-All-Summer-Long

Now is also the time to start thinking about starting a fall garden. Here’s a video that can give you some details on what grows in the fall and how to do it.

That’s all for this week! Have a great weekend! If you enjoyed it, please share on Facebook and Twitter!

As Author Cygnet Brown, Donna Brown has published several nonfiction books including Simply Vegetable Gardening: Simple Organic Gardening Tips for the Beginning Gardener, Using Diatomaceous Earth around the House and Yard, and Help from Kelp.

She is also the author of historical fiction series The Locket Saga. which includes When God Turned His Head and Soldiers Don’t Cry, the Locket Saga Continues, and, A Coward’s Solace, Book III of the Locket Saga, Book IV of the Locket Saga: Sailing Under the Black Flag is also on sale now!

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I have to confess that I have not been marketing as I had planned. I have gotten off track and am already not meeting the objectives that I set for myself at the beginning of the month.

My main marketing objectives that I have actually focused on this week have had to do more with introducing my latest book Sailing under the Black Flag to those people who already enjoy The Locket Saga series. In addition, I have been using my marketing time toward finding gainful employment—which I am calling my means of positive cash flow. My goal is to get a first shift job (or second with the weekends off will work as well) so that I can spend my weekends and some week nights attending events.

Discover Where the Train Jumped the Track

So, it isn’t that I have not been doing anything in marketing. It is just that I have not been following the plan that I set out to do in the first place. This doesn’t necessarily mean that I have failed either. It simply means that I need to re-evaluate. Therefore, I have to reassess my plan and decide to do something a little differently. The main problem for me in the system that I was trying to do was that I had too many little projects that were too much alike that also didn’t seem to bring any results. Therefore, I need to adjust my plans so that I not only am not getting bored with what I am doing, but also so that I can actually get better results with those activities.

Adjusting Tactics

So rather than doing one activity all afternoon long, I have chosen instead to focus on that one activity for just 25 minutes of nonstop focus. I will use what is known as the Pomodoro technique. I will divide my marketing time into 30 minute segments using 25 minutes for actually working on the project with 5 minutes between each session. Each session will focus on a single activity whether it’s sending emails, phoning, commenting on posts, reading, or creating interviews.

At the beginning of each session I will set my timer for 25 minutes and begin that activity and do that activity for the entire 25 minutes. Then at the end of the session during the last 5 minutes, I will note exactly what I did, how far I got, and how much time I invested into that aspect of marketing. The current areas of marketing that I am working on are contacting booksellers, finding reviewers, getting my books in libraries, touching base with authors (particularly other Indie authors) in the historical (particularly American) fiction so that I can interview them (as well as review their books) for my blog, as well as contacting and getting appointments to participate on podcasts and radio. I will still use the templates that I made earlier this month, but rather than spending all day doing a single activity that leaves me bored to tears, I will do just 25 minutes of that activity and then go onto the next area of marketing.

As Author Cygnet Brown, Donna Brown has published several nonfiction books including Simply Vegetable Gardening: Simple Organic Gardening Tips for the Beginning Gardener, Using Diatomaceous Earth around the House and Yard, and Help from Kelp.

She is also the author of historical fiction series The Locket Saga. which includes When God Turned His Head and Soldiers Don’t Cry, the Locket Saga Continues, and, A Coward’s Solace, Book III of the Locket Saga, Book IV of the Locket Saga: Sailing Under the Black Flag is also on sale now!

In other cases, bad things happen to us because of what people do. Joseph had a promise from God. He was his father’s favorite son from his favorite wife. Joseph was a dreamer who had several visions that his family would bow to him. He made certain that everyone knew about his dream. This made everyone angry with him including his father. His brothers became so jealous of him that they sold him into slavery. Joseph was a good honest man. His master, Potiphar put him in a place of authority in his home. Potiphar’s wife wanted to sleep with Joseph, but Joseph respected his master too much and refused. Potiphar’s wife was so angry with his refusal that she lied to her husband and accused Joseph of making a pass at her.

Potiphar sent Joseph to prison. The king’s butler and baker went to prison and they had dreams. Joseph correctly interpreted their dreams. One was punished with death while the other returned to his position in the king’s house. He forgot about Joseph’s interpretation of his dream until the king started having dreams and he told the king about how Joseph could interpret dreams. When Joseph interpreted the king’s dream, the king made Joseph his number two man. There were seven years of prosperity just as Joseph had said. Then during the seven predicted years of drought and famine, Joseph’s family came back into the picture because they needed the king’s grain to survive. When Joseph’s brothers discovered that Joseph was still alive, they were frightened. Rather than being vindictive, Joseph told them that what they had meant for evil, God made for good. He told his brothers, “What you have meant for evil, God has destined for the good.

In Romans 8:28 it says, “All things work to the good of those who love the Lord who are called according to his purpose.”

Joseph realized that God had a purpose for his life. He knew that no matter what happened to him God would live up to his promises because Joseph knew God had a plan for his life and all that he was going through had something to do with that plan. Learn God’s purpose for your life by asking God to reveal that purpose to you and do it. Remember, that as long as you are still breathing, your purpose is not yet fulfilled on this earth. Have faith in the fact that God always has reasons for delaying his promises. Trust him. He has everything under control.

(Scripture reference: Genesis 37, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45)

As Author Cygnet Brown, Donna Brown has published several nonfiction books including Simply Vegetable Gardening: Simple Organic Gardening Tips for the Beginning Gardener, Using Diatomaceous Earth around the House and Yard, and Help from Kelp.

She is also the author of historical fiction series The Locket Saga. which includes When God Turned His Head and Soldiers Don’t Cry, the Locket Saga Continues, and, A Coward’s Solace, Book III of the Locket Saga, Book IV of the Locket Saga: Sailing Under the Black Flag is also on sale now!

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Working on Final Edits of yet another Tome of the Locket Saga

Now that Sailing under the Black Flag is out and available for general purchase and I have the templates that I need to do my marketing projects, I can again focus on moving onto other projects. The writing process doesn’t end when a book is launched. The process just continues on with more writing projects. One of those projects is Book V of the Locket Saga: In the Shadow of the Millpond. I finished the second draft of this book last summer and am currently working on my final editing process.

When doing this final editing process, I work from macro-issues such as story continuity down to micro-issues such as getting rid of passive language, and ensuring that I am using the right punctuation and spelling.

I learned that by editing in this order, getting the story line right, and then fixing more detailed problems like getting the right word or punctuation, I am not editing material that I will eventually edit out anyway. This is a time saving devise that often gets overlooked in fiction writing, but this can literally save days of work over the course of the editing process.

Starting New Research to Keep the Series Going

In addition to working on this final editing process, I am starting research for Book VII of the Locket Saga which has the current working title of Two Rivers about two cousins who in 1803 take different rivers. Andrew Mayford takes the Mississippi southward to Natchez, and Isaac Thorton takes the Missouri westward with the Lewis and Clark expedition. Not only will they be going in different directions physically, but the paths they take will take them in different directions philosophically as well.

Thinking about another Garden-Based Book Project

Another project that I was talking to my brother about today was the idea of sustainable gardening. This concept goes deeper than organic gardening and even deeper than permaculture in that the focus isn’t just on the plant life, or the domesticated animals that are brought to help sustain the humans living on an acreage, but focuses on the life cycles of every organism including micro-organisms. The idea is based on the premise that the earth is not just an inert pile of pulverized rocks that will function with chemicals pumped into it but is a living breathing organism in its own right.

The idea includes the idea that human beings don’t have to destroy the earth in order to sustain himself, but can work with nature, recycling all of his wastes back into the soil and benefiting all creatures in a symbiotic relationship.

As Author Cygnet Brown, Donna Brown has published several nonfiction books including Simply Vegetable Gardening: Simple Organic Gardening Tips for the Beginning Gardener, Using Diatomaceous Earth around the House and Yard, and Help from Kelp.

She is also the author of historical fiction series The Locket Saga. which includes When God Turned His Head and Soldiers Don’t Cry, the Locket Saga Continues, and, A Coward’s Solace, Book III of the Locket Saga, Book IV of the Locket Saga: Sailing Under the Black Flag is also on sale now!

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Thanks, everyone who has already wished me a happy birthday today! Not only is July the month that I was born, but it is also the month when nature’s bounty from the garden is in full swing. Alas, my pressure canner is currently several states away, but that doesn’t prevent me from writing about the process!

I believe that if I plant it, I should eat it and that’s why I believe that it is important for me to eat every vegetable in my garden. Here is an article I wrote: Using Every Summer Vegetable in My Vegetable Garden and the strategy I use to make it happen.

You’ve happily worked in your garden. First you worked the soil and got it ready for planting, then you planted, watered, weeded, mulched, fertilized, and sometimes had to fight the elements to get your garden to produce. Now you are seeing the first of the fruits of your labor. You pick it you bring it in. Now, what do you do with it? Check out My Strategies here http://hubpages.com/living/Making-Full-Use-of-the-Vegetable-Garden

Last but not least here is two video I found online about this same subject.

Happy Gardening!

As Author Cygnet Brown, Donna Brown has published several nonfiction books including Simply Vegetable Gardening: Simple Organic Gardening Tips for the Beginning Gardener, Using Diatomaceous Earth around the House and Yard, and Help from Kelp.

She is also the author of historical fiction series The Locket Saga. which includes When God Turned His Head and Soldiers Don’t Cry, the Locket Saga Continues, and, A Coward’s Solace, Book III of the Locket Saga, Book IV of the Locket Saga: Sailing Under the Black Flag is also on sale now!

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Poor Results from Email Campaign

IAs I said in previous posts, I have made reaching out the book buyers my focus. By this weekend I intend to have the first introductory email out to booksellers and will begin locating and connecting with reviewers. In addition, I will begin sending a second email to the booksellers concerning the Locket Saga, particularly now that the fourth book in the series is now available for sale and wholesale pricing for the book. Just because my marketing focus will move on, does not mean that I should stop working to get more booksellers to buy and sell my books. The process is really quite boring right now, because I have received no feedback as of yet. I guess the lack of feedback indicates that is that the emails are not working.

Getting Ready to Launch Sailing Under the Black Flag

I have been selling quite a few Sailing under the Black Flag to friends and family despite the online price increase. I am making plans to do an online launch. More on this in a later post.

I have been thinking about attending more events over the course of the next several months. Now that I am east of the Mississippi, I am closer to more people. I am even looking for another source of positive cash flow (read that to mean I am looking for a job).

As Author Cygnet Brown, Donna Brown has published several nonfiction books including Simply Vegetable Gardening: Simple Organic Gardening Tips for the Beginning Gardener, Using Diatomaceous Earth around the House and Yard, and Help from Kelp.

She is also the author of historical fiction series The Locket Saga. which includes When God Turned His Head and Soldiers Don’t Cry, the Locket Saga Continues, and, A Coward’s Solace, Book III of the Locket Saga, Book IV of the Locket Saga: Sailing Under the Black Flag is also on sale now!

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By this weekend intend to have all of the emails sent out to the booksellers. I didn’t realize how long it would take me to send out an email to over 800 recipients. As I am writing this, I still have not had any responses from any of the booksellers. There are so many variables as to why no one is opening my emails. My best guess is that the email that I wrote was not compelling enough to get any responses. Perhaps the headline was not compelling enough for anyone to open them. I may have to contact these booksellers via phone if I want further contact via email.